Hi Chris (and others)
First off: there's no real OM content in this message, but I decided to send
it to the list too, just in case someone knowledgeable about this stuff
missed out on this thread before.
Thanks for the interesting photos.
You're welcome! :)
Ah, I forgot to say, there was some danger to these things after all: when
removing the silverish 20mm casing from the shackle I had put it in many
years ago, I had to apply a lot of force. All of a sudden the thing shot out
of the shackle and my thumb "nicely ricocheted" off of the shackle, causing
the skin/flesh to get ripped open over a length of roughly a centimetre
(rather deeply too, I might add) ;)
I cannot recognise the individual items, except of course the 27mm Mauser
cases which are unmistakeable,
Yes, I was already quite certain these were fired by Tornadoes. BTW, is the
Tornado the only airplane that uses (this type of) 27mm rounds?
but I can make a few observations.
H.E. means High Explosive and is likely to describe the bullet that
was in the case so marked.
Hmmm, so there might have been some "not-so-innocent" stuff after all. I'm
not certain if I'm right where my asumptions as to the year in which they
were used are right, but if so, the only casing on which I could find this
"HE" indicator would date back to 1961. Interestingly enough, that casing
also has the "RG" indicator, which I was figuring refered to target practice
shells, as most of the 30mm stuff I found has this indicator on it.
TP means practice, as does Prac.
Good, that rules out a LOT of casings then (some 970f them have either of
these two indicators on them), the only other ones are the green ones and
the "1961-shell".
DEFA probably refers to Aden cannon shells which were used by the
Jaguar, the Harrier and the Hunter (from many, many years ago).
The Harrier? Interesting that that plane uses 30mm shells! I somehow had
always figured it to be a "20mm plane". I wonder what the green ones are
from, a Mirage perhaps?
The 20mm shells and cases were probably used by the F16, some of
which were based at Twente AB, Enschede nearby.
:)))
Tell me about it, I live in Enschede ;)))
BTW: The father of the friend of mine who gave me some 150 of these 20mm
shackles works (or worked; haven't seen them for years) at that airbase.
It makes me want to travel to Nordhorn range to have a look around
myself.
Well, apart from this stuff, one encountered flash-bombs(?) and some other
types of bombs which looked like "dumb bombs", all painted blue. For the
rest, I should have a rather representative selection of what could be found
over there.
Note though that the security at the range was not high, there aren't even
fences around it. There is one watch tower (for air control mostly, I
presume) and at times on Sundays when we were searching we saw small groups
of some 4 "men in white", which is when we used to drop ourselves on the
ground and hide from them :)
Having said that, I have no idea what the level of security would be on days
that the range was actually in use, as I was wise enough to stay far, far
away from the range on weekdays. It should have been cool to take pictures
of the planes when practicing, but one never knows if one of the bullets
ricochets off of something. Furthermore, military people do not seem to be
over-delighted to see people photographing their planes/bases, so I figured
it would probably not be a very wise idea to bring my OM along (hey! now
there is some Oly content in this message after all ;)).
Unfortunately, the last RAF base in Germany (Brüggen, west
of Mönchen-Gladbach) will close before the end of this year and
Nordhorn will not be used by the British any longer.
Really?
So even if I wanted to do so, there would be no more chance to take pictures
there of the planes in action. I think the last time I went there (1988?!?)
the range was still in use.
Good, thanks a lot for your replies, and perhaps the person you knew
(weapons instructor?) can help out a bit more in identifying the
bullets/casings?
Cheers!
Olafo
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